MOBILE, Alabama – Were Edward Allen Varner’s actions during a fatal traffic crash so brazen, so reckless and so indifferent to human life that they constitute murder?

Or do they amount to something less?

It is a question that Mobile County Circuit Court jurors, based on a question they asked Judge Rick Stout, are struggling with.

During deliberations Wednesday afternoon, the jury asked for the difference between murder and manslaughter. Stout re-read the jury instructions he had given earlier and then sent the jury home for the night.

At the same time, one courtroom over, Circuit Judge Michael Youngpeter was giving similar instructions in an unrelated murder case. Jurors in that case wanted to know if an accomplice could be found guilty of murder even if he did not fire the fatal shots.

In Varner’s case, jurors have a range of options. The top count is reckless murder, which would carry a prison term of 10 years to life. The jury could opt for lesser alternatives, including manslaughter, vehicular homicide or a misdemeanor, criminally negligent homicide.

Mobile County District Attorney Ashley Rich said those lesser options might be appropriate had it been a normal day on June 14, 2012, and Varrner failed to exercise sufficient care when his 2000 Pontiac Firebird crashed into an oncoming BMW on Dawes Road in western Mobile County.

“That’s not what we have here,” she said during her closing argument. “We have speeding, reckless driving. We have DUI – driving under the influence – and crossing over the center line.”

Rich pointed out that the road was slick frlom a recent rain, and Varner was driving at speeds of more than 90 mph while he was drunk. The wreck claimed the life of 23-month-old Brian Teague and seriously injured the toddler’s mother and stepfather.

Defense attorney Robert “Bucky” Thomas argued that there is not enough evidence to prove the state’s allegations beyond a reasonable doubt. He noted during his closing argument that no one saw the actual accident.

But Rich argued that the collision was a direct result of “conscious choices” that the defendant made. She argued that he showed “extreme indifference to the value of human life” and should be held accountable.